The name makes them sound like ultra-compact, large-impact bombs. Large-impact they are - but not because they hit one precise target with a major blast but rather because they explode into sometimes hundreds of subminitions (bomblets) and scatter themselves far and wide. The approximate area one cluster bomb can attack? A football field.

The distribution of the bomblets from every cluster munition fired from artillery or rocket systems, or simply dropped from the sky, is imprecise and indiscriminate. As such, cluster munitions often prove deadly to innocent civilians, including those far from the central target under attack.